Ruby Fever

Chapter 10

I paced back and forth, trying to match the speed of my body to the speed of my brain. I had notified most of our allies and most of the probable high-risk targets that we were under attack and declined a dozen offers of assistance. Cornelius’ sister and brother were in DC on business, in the public eye and well protected. My disaster of an aunt had been pulled off the street in Mexico by a private security firm. They would sit on her until the danger passed.

I had tried Wahl’s cell, but the call went straight to voice mail, which likely meant the FBI agent was still recuperating.

I also had a long and grueling conversation regarding logistics and compensation with the man who would help us make sure Arkan went deaf and blind. It was like swimming in a very small pool with a very large shark. It was so bad, I texted Arabella two-thirds of the way through and let her take over the bargaining.

Alessandro and Konstantin had left an hour ago. They would neutralize Arkan’s mole in the DA’s office. I wasn’t sure what would happen next. Arkan could hit us as soon as he realized his agent had been compromised, or he could wait and gather all of his forces for one decisive assault. Alessandro promised to video call during the meeting. If an attack came, it would be soon.

I had a nagging feeling that I had overlooked something. What was it? What hole did I fail to plug?

“If you keep doing this, I’ll have to replace the rug,” Bern informed me.

He sat at a horseshoe-shaped desk, with an array of monitors arranged around him. When we lived in the warehouse, all of his equipment had been contained in the small room we called the Hut of Evil. Since we’d moved, he had upgraded to a full-blown Lair. The computer lab now occupied the entire first floor of a short tower we had built to Bern’s specifications. The horseshoe desk and the space around it took up most of the floor, with the gaming room featuring a row of computers and gaming chairs separated off to the side by a glass wall. A small fridge stuffed with drinks and a couch on which Runa right now napped completed the furnishings. Bern ruled over his kingdom like an ancient despot, and his tone suggested that he had judged my pacing to be a capital offense.

He’d asked me to come, but when I got there, I was presented with his back and some furious typing.

“What am I forgetting?” I asked him.

“Food. Sleep.”

“Haha. When was the last time you slept?”

“That’s not relevant. Okay. You may look.”

I came over and stood by his chair. A black screen greeted me with some indecipherable code.

“Honey?” Bern said.

Runa pulled herself off the couch and stumbled over to us.

Bern raised his right hand and very deliberately pressed the Enter key.

Code blossomed on the screen, scrolling at dizzying speed. The display went dark.

“I love it,” Runa said. She leaned over, hugged Bern, and kissed his cheek.

Bern smiled.

Runa turned around and went back to her couch.

“What am I looking at?” I asked him.

“I crashed Arkan’s network,” Bern said.

We looked at the dark screen.

“Do you think he’s screaming right now?” I asked.

Bern gave me another smile.

We looked at the screen some more.

My cousin typed a quick sequence. “I have something for you.”

A large monitor directly above us showed the inside of an armored car. Alessandro was in the driver’s seat. The dark-haired woman next to him wore the tactical uniform of our guards. I didn’t recognize her.

The woman said something in Russian in Konstantin’s voice.

“How am I seeing this?”

Bern paused the video. “A hidden dashboard cam. All of our vehicles have them.”

I wasn’t aware of that upgrade. “Since when?”

“Since two months ago.”

“Shouldn’t I have approved something like that?”

“I approved it,” Bern said. “As the Chief of Surveillance and Cyber Security.”

“Chief of what now?”

“Surveillance and Cyber Security. That’s how I’m written into our incorporation papers. This is a good security measure.”

“Can I disable the camera in my vehicle?”

“Yes.”

He left it at that. Fine, I would ask Grandma Frida. Ten to one she had installed them in the first place. Right now, I had bigger fish to fry.

“Are you spying on Alessandro?”

“No, I’m spying on the prince.”

“How old is this recording?” I asked.

“Half an hour.”

“I never took you for a man willing to play second fiddle,” Konstantin said in English. “You were raised to lead your House, the crumbling ruin that it is. You are a man who would rather captain a sinking ship that’s yours than be a sailor on a luxury liner.”

“You serve the throne. You will never sit on it.” Alessandro’s voice was flat and quiet.

“But I wasn’t raised with an expectation of leading. You were, Count Sagredo. She is the Head of her House, issuing orders, making decisions, and what does that make you? A loyal bodyguard? A pretty face in her bed?”

You asshole.

“It has to chafe a bit, trading your independence and your birthright for a seat at her table. You know they only listen to you because she’s there. They tolerate you as long as you make her happy. Not quite the loving family you always wanted.”

Alessandro didn’t answer. Did it actually bother him? Is that the way he saw it?

“If you have a fight, they’ll always take her side. If you break up, they’ll line up to kick you on your way out the door. The only way to secure your position is though children, but we both know the compatibility isn’t there.”

Anxiety squeezed me. I wanted to have children. Not now, but eventually. I wanted to have Alessandro’s children. I didn’t give a crap what kind of powers they might have. I just loved him, and I would love our children. They would be smart and funny like him. They might have his eyes and his smile. And in my selfish little love, I never wondered how he felt about it. His bloodline was so long. His entire childhood was about learning to protect and preserve it. He was always expected to pass his powers to the next generation.

What if our children weren’t antistasi?

“Maybe all of that is true,” Alessandro said. “However, her mother is an excellent shot, and yet all of the former boyfriends and girlfriends of her children are still breathing despite their many sins. What did you think when your mother strangled Liudmilla in that hotel room? How did your perfect older brother take it?”

Konstantin’s smile widened and he bared his teeth at Alessandro. It bothered him. Alessandro’s thrust had hit home.

“My mother loves us unconditionally,” Konstantin said. “She wishes only the best for us, and she will take sins upon herself for our benefit. Can you say the same? More importantly, can you do the same?”

Alessandro turned his head to glance at him.

“What can you offer her, really?”

“Whatever you are thinking, stop thinking it,” Alessandro told him.

Konstantin smiled. “Recently I’ve had an occasion to visit the Siberian diamond mines. They have a saying there. ‘A man who finds a diamond never gets to keep it.’ Thank you for finding this diamond, Sasha.”

Alessandro pulled into the parking lot in front of the new Justice Center, parked, and looked at the prince. I almost took a step back. He’d gone into his Artisan mode, and his face was so cold.

“This isn’t the Imperium, Konstantin. And she isn’t a rock, she is a person. You’ve grown accustomed to thinking everything belongs to your family including people. It’s a bad habit. In this country people have freedom and a choice. Whatever choice she makes, I’ll help her realize it. If someone decides to block her path, I will remove them.”

Konstantin gave a theatrical shiver. “Very menacing.”

“1547.”

“Is that supposed to mean something?” Konstantin raised his eyebrows, but his pose shifted slightly.

“The code to the little wooden cabin your parents use in Berekhino when the pressure becomes too much and they want to hide and fish on Oka River. Consider your next move carefully.”

The screen went dark.

“I’ve looked up the Liudmilla incident,” Bern said. “Konstantin’s older brother had a fiancée who hung herself in her hotel room while on holiday with her family. She had a history of ‘mental instability’ according to Russian press. Make of that what you will.”

I crossed my arms and stared at the screen.

“The way he talks about you suggests he’s thought about this. It’s not a spur-of-the-moment thing.”

“Yep,” Runa said from the couch. “He watches you.”

“I caught that.” Prince Berezin had developed an unhealthy interest in me. No, it was more likely that the Russian Imperium developed an interest in me, which was bad any way you looked at it. I would have to figure out a good way to discourage it. Permanently.

A door slammed shut, and Arabella burst into the tower brandishing a piece of paper. “Four hundred and seventy-two thousand dollars?!”

Runa jerked upright. “What’s going on?”

“Nothing,” Bern told her. “Go back to bed, baby.”

“Are you kidding right now? Is this a joke?” Arabella waved her arms.

Bern squinted at Arabella. “I told you to stop playing that gacha game. Spending real money on digital characters can only lead to trouble, especially considering the odds.”

“It’s not my gaming bill! It’s the bill from the Office of Records!”

Ouch.

“I’m going to kill Leon,” Arabella growled.

Bern put on his noise-cancelling headphones and stabbed his finger at the meeting room.

“Let’s talk in there.” I headed to the gaming room, texting Leon as I walked.

“Four hundred and seventy-two thousand dollars!” Arabella snarled.

Leon shrugged. “I thought it was rather reasonable.”

Arabella stared at him, and I wondered if her head would explode. My sister’s volume control had suffered a critical malfunction. She seemed to be communicating in declarative statements only.

“Look,” Leon said. “Twelve cars, two broken light poles, and a chunk of the parking lot that has to be repaved. We’re paying replacement cost for the cars based on the current market value. We’re giving them an option of taking a lump sum or a replacement vehicle. Most of them want the lump sum, which actually favors us . . .”

She planted her arms on the table and leaned forward. “That’s not the point.”

“They could have charged us for the building,” he said in his most reasonable tone.

“We shouldn’t be paying any of these costs. We did not cause this damage. Xavier, Gunderson, and Arkan are the ones who wrecked everything.”

“I checked with Sabrian,” I said. “We can sue Gunderson’s estate, but they would likely turn around and sue us for wrongful death. They won’t win, but it will be long and painful and will drag on forever, at the end of which we will be left with a bunch of legal fees. Unless we can get House Gunderson to pay them, but according to their credit reports, their financial situation could be better, so even if we did win, it would take years to—”

“We don’t have to sue Gunderson. Let the Keeper sue Gunderson.”

“It’s really difficult to talk to you when you’re like this,” Leon said.

“It’s very important that we maintain a cordial relationship with the Office of Records,” I said.

“Which person in this family is responsible for finances?” Arabella asked.

“You are,” I told her.

“Great. I’m so glad we got this cleared up. We are not paying this bill.”

“Yes, we are,” I said.

“It’s not our responsibility!”

“Mom was in danger. She went to the Office of Records. They kept her safe until I got there. Then we had a giant fight in the parking lot and the cars belonging to the employees of the Office of Records were damaged. Someone has to make them whole. Xavier and Gunderson aren’t going to do it.”

“Not our problem,” Arabella said. “The Office of Records should have protected Mom. It is their civic duty. They don’t get credit for not being assholes.”

“It’s like talking to a wall,” Leon said.

She turned her head and hit him with a death glare. “Did you even try to negotiate?”

“I did.”

“How did that go? Walk me through it.”

He shrugged. “I went in and met Michael. A somber looking dude. I told him that I was there on behalf of House Baylor to take care of the damages. He gave me a list. I looked at it. It seemed reasonable. I offered our apologies and told him we would handle it.”

“And what did he say?”

“Nothing. I think he might be mute.”

“He isn’t,” I said.

Arabella straightened. “I’m going to take that list, roll it into a tube, and shove it up Michael’s ass.”

“No!” Leon and I said at the same time.

“Yes.”

“Don’t do this,” I told her. “That is a direct order.”

“I don’t care.”

“Arabella, if you try to fight with him, he will kill you. He scares the shit out of me. He’s death and darkness.”

She raised her chin. “Good. I could use the exercise.”

Oh God. I knew that look. She wouldn’t listen to me. She wouldn’t listen to anyone right now. I needed serious backup.

I grabbed my phone and dialed Nevada. She picked up instantly. I switched the call to FaceTime. My sister was in the car, in the passenger seat.

“Arabella’s upset about the bill from the Office of Records and wants to confront Michael,” I snitched.

Nevada leaned into the phone. I flipped it, so the screen faced Arabella.

“You can’t do that,” Nevada said.

“Watch me.”

“If you do this, you will put the whole family in danger.”

“What is the Keeper going to do? Assault us? He’ll have to get in line.”

“Listen to me.” Nevada’s voice vibrated with authority. She sounded almost like Mom. “You’re having an emotional moment because you’re still upset about Mom being hurt and Linus falling into a coma. You want to punish someone for it, but the Keeper of Records can’t be that person. He didn’t hurt Mom. Michael didn’t hurt Mom. Michael actually saved Mom. And Catalina, and Cornelius. You aren’t being fair.”

“Well, it’s not fair that Mom got hurt, is it?” Some of the heat went out of Arabella’s voice.

Mom loved us and she was the ultimate authority when we were kids. But for most of our adolescence, Nevada took care of us as well. She ran the business that fed us and kept a roof over our heads, and when we had problems we didn’t know how to handle, we went to her first and Mom second.

“We need to take care of this,” Nevada said. “Right now this is a problem that can easily be solved with money. If you escalate it, we won’t be able to fix it at all. Do you need money? Because I’ve got loads, and I don’t mind at all making sure that the people who saved Mom are not left holding the bag.”

Oh, that was smart.

Arabella drew back. “Keep your money. We have our own.”

“Bug is looking for Xavier,” Nevada said. “We will find that asshole, and when we do, Connor will squish him like the cockroach he is.”

“Yeah, yeah, whatever.” Arabella waved her hand.

I ended the call.

“You are not wrong,” Leon said. “But you know we’re right.”

“Yes,” Arabella growled. “Thank you for taking care of the bill and the negotiations. I’ll issue the payment.”

“You’re welcome.”

She got up and went out. Well, that had gone better than expected.

Leon put a long object wrapped in a towel onto the table. “For you.”

I pulled the towel aside. Linus’ null sword. Oh my God. It had survived.

“I pulled it out of Rhino’s wreckage,” he said.

“You are the best!”

“I am,” Leon said solemnly. “It’s the heavy burden I bear.”

Bern waved at me through the glass wall.

“I have to go,” I told him.

“I’ll come with. I want to see this.”

The big monitor showed the inside of Lenora Jordan’s office, a space of oversize bookcases, red drapes, and Persian rugs. Lenora Jordan, a black woman in her forties, sat behind a heavy desk of reclaimed wood. She wasn’t just the Harris County DA, she was its paladin, resolute, incorruptible, and unyielding. She wore a grey power suit, but it might as well have been armor. The Houses of Houston recognized the need for law and order, and they chose her as its enforcer. Lenora Jordan didn’t know how to be intimidated.

Her face was impassive. She was looking at the laptop in front of her. On the other side of the desk, Alessandro and Konstantin sat in large leather chairs. Konstantin had shifted back into Smirnov. He was tall, dour, and stooped, and he fidgeted as he sat. I’d never seen him do that so far, so it must’ve been one of Smirnov’s mannerisms.

A careful knock echoed through the room. The door must have edged open off-screen because Lenora looked up and nodded. Matt entered the room. The last time I’d seen him, when he came to pick up Alessandro, he’d worn a dress shirt with rolled-up sleeves, his hair was a mess, and his face had sported two days of stubble. Today he wore a black suit, his hair was brushed back, and his tan face was clean shaven. He looked like what he was, a young successful attorney.

He strode into the room and stopped in the middle of the rug in front of Lenora’s desk. “You wanted to see me . . .”

He saw Smirnov. In a split second his expression tore like a flimsy mask. His hand went into his jacket.

Alessandro shot across the room, insanely fast. He gripped Matt’s arm, twisted, and a gun fell onto the carpet. If I had blinked, I would’ve missed it. One moment Matt was reaching for his gun, the next he was bent over, his arm clamped in Alessandro’s fingers.

“Thank you, Prime Sagredo,” Lenora said. “I’ll take it from here.”

Alessandro released Matt and stepped back.

Thick chains burst from the rug, spiraling around Matt in a flash. In half a second, they gripped him in a magical fist, lifting him off the ground two feet into the air. His glasses sat askew on his nose, but they did nothing to diminish the defiance that twisted his face.

He looked down at Lenora and sneered. “Ah. I always wondered what this felt like.”

“You betrayed this office,” Lenora said.

“Yes.”

“Why?”

“Money, of course,” Matt said. His expression turned harsh. “Do you even know what my starting salary was? No, of course you don’t. Sixty-four thousand dollars. I’ve been here for three years. Now I make sixty-eight.”

Lenora remained unmoved.

A little color came back into Matt’s face. He kept going.

“I graduated from Columbia with one hundred ninety thousand in law school debt, and that’s on top of the hundred grand I still owe to Baylor U for my bachelor’s. My apartment costs three grand a month, and I hate it. Every day I deal with Houses and Primes, whose brats get busted for underage drinking and DUI in their Mercedes and Audis, while I bust my ass so I can drive a Honda. I have to buy my suits on credit, just so I won’t be laughed at.”

“Is that so?” Lenora tilted her head. “One hundred and seventy-two dollars.”

“What is that?”

“The monthly food stamp allowance my mother was receiving the year I graduated from high school. Tell me again about your suits. Are they nice?”

Matt blinked, then recovered. “You know what, whatever. You are a shitty boss, Lenora. You don’t take care of your people, so I found someone who does. Whatever you’re hoping to get out of me, forget it. The hex in my head is better than anything you can throw at it.”

Matt twisted his neck to glare at Smirnov. “And you? Your days are numbered.”

A door swung open, and Nevada walked in and stood beside Lenora.

Matt’s face blanched.

“Mr. Benson,” Nevada said.

Matt didn’t answer.

Nevada picked up the corners of the rug and folded it in half, exposing the dark floor underneath. The chains slid out of her way, shifting Matt aside, and straightened again.

“Last night Xavier Secada put a chunk of metal through my mother’s leg,” my sister said.

Matt swallowed and licked his lips. “I’m sorry to hear that.”

“So was I.” Nevada took out a piece of chalk. “I think you and I should have a nice long chat.”

My phone rang. An unfamiliar foreign number starting with 351. Now what?

I waved at Bern. He muted the feed, and I took the call on speaker.

“Prime Baylor speaking.”

“My name is Christina Almeida, Prime of House Almeida.”

Female, young, slight trace of an accent, not Spanish, not Italian, something else.

Bern’s fingers flew over the keyboard. The search engine spat the results. House Almeida, a Portuguese House, old nobility, rich, made money from rubber and cork . . .

“How can I help you?”

Another page of results. Christina Almeida, Magus Praelia, Prime. A warrior mage. Like Buller, who conjured armor, praelia conjured weapons and they used them with deadly skill.

“I’ve come to retrieve my fiancé,” Christina said.

“Who would that be?”

“Alessandro Sagredo.”

What?

A text popped up with GPS coordinates.

You have questions. That’s understandable. Meet me at this location in one hour. Let’s talk.

I showed the coordinates to Bern. He plugged them into the search engine and Google Maps obliged. A park, ten minutes down the road from us.

Arkan made his move. That was so fast. How did he know?

“Will you come?” Christina asked.

An hour was tight, but it was enough time.

“I’ll be there,” I told her.

“Good. I am looking forward to our discussion.”